Vic mum wants answers from insane killer

Jean Priest has fought for years to force the prime suspect in her daughter's disappearance - notorious child killer Derek Percy - to tell her what happened to her little girl.

She knows it's a battle she may never win, but 44 years after seven-year-old Linda Stilwell disappeared, Ms Priest hopes to find out where her daughter's body is, or at least get some kind of closure.

The inquest into Linda's disappearance from the St Kilda foreshore on August 10, 1968, had been adjourned for four years while Ms Priest fought Deputy State Coroner Iain West's decision not to compel Percy to give evidence.

She took her fight to Victoria's highest court, which ruled in her favour and ordered the inquest be reconvened.

At a directions hearing on Wednesday, Ms Priest's lawyer Elizabeth McKinnon said Percy should be the first of eight witnesses requested by the family to give evidence when the inquest resumes.

But Percy's lawyer Cahal Fairfield said the inquest should first hear evidence from the other witnesses, including forensic psychologist Professor James Ogloff, who has had extensive involvement with Percy.

Mr Fairfield said the psychologist's evidence could raise issues bearing on the question of whether Percy should be compelled to give evidence, if he wished to resist doing so.

Outside court, Ms Priest said it would be a blow for the family if Percy did not give evidence.

"I'm not expecting him to say anything, but I'd like him to be made to give evidence," she said.

"We need to bury Linda with dignity, and we need to find some way to know that we've done everything we possibly can for her.

"That's why we've fought for all these years, so that we can get closure, some kind of closure.

"I'm at the stage where it's just sad to think that we've waited all this time, and we just need to know some answers."

Mr West made an interim finding in 2009 that Percy, who is linked to some of Australia's most notorious child killings, was in the area on the day Linda went missing.

But he decided not to compel Percy to give evidence because of concerns about its reliability, given Percy's mental state at the time of the abduction.

That decision was upheld by the Supreme Court but was overturned by the Court of Appeal last year.

Percy was found not guilty by reason of insanity of the July 20, 1969, murder of 12-year-old Yvonne Tuohy, who was snatched from Warneet Beach, southeast of Melbourne. He has been detained since that finding.

He is also a suspect in the unsolved murders of 15-year-olds Christine Sharrock and Marianne Schmidt on Sydney's Wanda Beach in 1965, six-year-old Alan Redston in Canberra in 1966, and three-year-old Simon Brook in Sydney in 1968.

He may have to answer questions about those deaths at Linda's inquest.

Percy has also been named as a suspect in the disappearance of the Beaumont children - Jane, nine, Arnna, seven, and Grant, four - in Adelaide in 1966.